Speaking Out

Instead of bouncing back I fell lower and lower until I began to actually worry. It felt like the blood had been drained from my body and replaced with lead. I was barely functional, and even the simplest conversations required vast amounts of energy. Then one day I discovered that my creativity was dead, inaccessible to me, and that’s when I became scared enough to do something about it. I could live without many things but not that, so I called a doctor and made an appointment.

I’ve followed Daniel Patterson for years. His 2 Michelin Star modern seafood space in San Francisco, Coi is one of the most sought after reservations in the country. What he and Roy Choi are doing with LocoL is inspiring and incredible. But reading this, is devastating but also not entirely a surprise.

Being a chef is a lonesome and thankless craft, full of late nights and missed holidays. A shift needs to happen in this country where mental health is not treated as a debilitating disease but an illness that’s supported and respected. We have lost too many people to mental health obstacles from every industry across the world.